I was referring more to the fact that it shouldn't have been that hard for Vader himself, or the Emperor, to figure out that a Tattooine-dwelling boy named Skywalker might be related to him. I'm hardly the first person to offer that criticism of what the prequels established, so I thought people would get the joke.

I was referring more to the fact that it shouldn't have been that hard for Vader himself, or the Emperor, to figure out that a Tattooine-dwelling boy named Skywalker might be related to him. I'm hardly the first person to offer that criticism of what the prequels established, so I thought people would get the joke.

Click to expand...

The fannish explanation of that is that Tattooine was chosen since it was somewhere to which Anakin would never want to return due to what happened with his mother. Whether that makes sense, I dunno.

I'm guessing Mace probably died, though if he didn't and he somehow managed to slip into hiding and avoid the Emperor's and Vader's troops and spies over the years he's probably keeping as low a profile as humanly possible.

After all, after Yoda he was the most senior and highest-ranking Jedi in the galaxy and would probably leave a pretty powerful Force trail. Masking himself from discovery by practicioners of the Dark Side would be his first priority because he could always change his physical appearance to fool the vast majority of regular citizens who happened to see him.

I'm guessing Mace probably died, though if he didn't and he somehow managed to slip into hiding and avoid the Emperor's and Vader's troops and spies over the years he's probably keeping as low a profile as humanly possible.

After all, after Yoda he was the most senior and highest-ranking Jedi in the galaxy and would probably leave a pretty powerful Force trail. Masking himself from discovery by practicioners of the Dark Side would be his first priority because he could always change his physical appearance to fool the vast majority of regular citizens who happened to see him.

Click to expand...

The Zahn-explanation for that is that the Dark Jedi that Yoda defeated on Dagobah (creating the Dark Side impression in the dead tree where Luke fights himself as Vader) acted as a 'shield' for Yoda's own force impression.

The largest living rodent is the capybara, which ranges from about one to one and a third meters in length. The largest known extinct rodent is estimated to have been three meters long, about the size of a horse or bull.

Yeah, the last real-life rodent that was the size of a fictional Tatooine womp rat lived long ago and has long since gone extinct. But can you imagine if a six-foot-long rodent of that size existed today and the numbers of sport and food hunters who would track the things to the brink of nonexistence?

That's why it's probably for the best that dinosaurs of prehistoric scale have been gone for about 65 million years. Rednecks, poachers and sportsmen would shoot most of them dead for enormous trophies and bragging rights.

Yeah, the last real-life rodent that was the size of a fictional Tatooine womp rat lived long ago and has long since gone extinct. But can you imagine if a six-foot-long rodent of that size existed today and the numbers of sport and food hunters who would track the things to the brink of nonexistence?

Click to expand...

If it existed today, its existence wouldn't be seen as any more unusual than that of any other large surviving mammal, because we'd be used to having it around. And thus it follows that there could be regulations limiting how much it was hunted, although poachers might violate those regulations and endanger the species' survival just as they do with tigers, elephants, rhinos, and many others.

That's why it's probably for the best that dinosaurs of prehistoric scale have been gone for about 65 million years. Rednecks, poachers and sportsmen would shoot most of them dead for enormous trophies and bragging rights.

Click to expand...

People still hunt dinosaurs all the time. We just call them birds these days.

Well, some modern ratites like cassowaries and ostriches are comparable in size to a troodon or deinonychus. And there were plenty of prehistoric dinosaurs that were no bigger than modern birds; we just don't know as much about the little ones as the big ones because smaller bones are less likely to survive long enough to be fossilized.

I think I was just going for a low blow there. Now that I think about it, I found the prequels' plotting of Palpatine's rise to be one of the more coherent and interesting things about them. But I can't make head nor tail of how I'm supposed to follow that chart.

Actually, even though I and a whole lot of other fans have given the Prequels (especially Episode I) flak for their overly complicated and political storylines that could seem muddled at times I'm probably in the minority when I give Lucas credit for wanting to tackle the newer trilogy in a more sophisticated and textured manner, even if the results were often clinical and missed the dramatic target. While I think his execution was too dry and stodgy at times and removed a little too much of the adventure and thrill from Star Wars films, his very political and Machiavellian scripts for I, II and III are proof that the SW universe isn't really aimed at kids and youngsters as much as critics like to take pokes at Lucas for turning his universe into a colossal toy and merchandising empire that has even sold kid's toothpaste and Band-Aids. Only older, more worldly and sophisticated audiences can grasp a lot of the political maneuvering and backstabbing in the Prequels and I have to thank Lucas for making his universe more sophisticated (if perhaps less fun and exciting) in those films.

I do think the flow chart above is a bit overcomplicated and would confuse the living crap out of someone who isn't already intimately familiar with the Saga and Palpatine's rise to Emperor of that galaxy, but it sure beats a much simpler and less interesting diagram that's dumbed down for a much younger audience.